Chandler & Price

In 1990, Gary Metras purchased a 1930s-era Chandler & Price press able to handle an eight-by-twelve-inch sheet; it is hand-fed, but has a motor in addition to its foot treadle. “I like letterpress for poetry because this is a machine that you control,” says Metras. “Too much modern technology has made us just ‘operators,’ and then you’re no longer a craftsman.”

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Credit: Gary Metras

Colophon

A colophon, set and locked in the chase, for Adastra poet Mary Jane White's translation of New Year's: An Elegy for Rilke by Marina Tsvetaeva (2007).

Composing Stick

Gertrude Halstead

Gertrude Halstead, poet laureate of Worcester, Massachusetts, printing a page of her first book, memories like burrs (2006).

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Credit: Gary Metras

Michael Miller

Adastra poet Michael Miller working on his book Each Day (2005).

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Credit: Gary Metras

Type Chase

Gary Metras locks two pages of type in a chase. "We don't know how so much in this world actually works," he says," so I chose letterpress in part because we can all gather around this machine and understand it."